Frank Hubeny

Access—Six Sentence Story

The rebellion against the Midianites began when Gideon ignited the dry Asherah pole to burn the sacrifice to the Lord. The wind blew across the Israelites with the strength of a Holy Spirit revival.

As a result Gideon gained access to a force of 32,000 men to battle the 135,000 Midianites camped in the valley below. The Midianites watched the incoming storm of Gideon’s army build up against them to the point of having nightmares that the pickings this year would come at the cost of their own lives.

On the Israelite side the Lord wanted to make sure they did not think of Him as some two-bit Baal who relied solely on their natural strengths to get things done. He told Gideon to reduce his forces to 10,000 men and then to 300 which meant at that level only the Lord could win this battle.

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Denise offers the prompt word “access” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

To find out what really happened, see Judges 6-7.

What’s Flowering Where You Are

Dale offers the prompt “what’s flowering where you are” for this week’s Cosmic Photo Challenge.

We are currently travelling in southern Florida between Tampa and Miami. I noticed these while walking on sidewalks in the Miami area.

I don’t know what these plants are or even if they are technically flowers, but they were colorful which drew my attention to them.

Rescue—Ovi Poetry Challenge

It takes no brains to take offense
since wicked stuff makes little sense.
His rescue comes through penitence.
Call on the Lord and live.

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Ronovan Hester offers “” as inspiration for this week’s Ovi Poetry Challenge. Also posted on Poet’s Corner.

Romans 10:13
For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.

Some of the colorful things the high tide left behind

Psalm 100:5

Linda G. Hill’s One Liner Wednesday.

*Badge by Laura @ riddlefromthemiddle.com*

Kick—Six Sentence Story

After the service Steve approached the ministers. He told them he wanted to see people the way the Lord saw them. No one would be worth redeeming, including himself, if the Lord saw people as irreparably damaged and grave-bound as he saw them.

They prayed for him, but his head would not acknowledge even the slightest kick of sympathy toward anyone.

It took time for Steve to receive the blessing he sought. When he did the dam of darkness exploded through the love of God.

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Denise offers the prompt word “kick” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

“I never knew how to worship until I knew how to love.” Henry Ward (found on worship leader Toni Bogart Syvrud’s contact card)

Either Stand in the Gap or Take the Mark of the Beast

Ezekiel 22:30
And I sought for a man among them, that should make up the hedge, and stand in the gap before me for the land, that I should not destroy it: but I found none.

Revelation 13:16-17
¹⁶And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads:
¹⁷And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.

When I woke up this morning the dots were connected between these verses. If I’ve got this wrong let me know in the comments.

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Those with the mark of the beast show their support of the beast when they speak or through the things they do, because through their words or actions their support is visible to all just as if it were written on their foreheads or on their outstretched right hands. Those who stand in the gap refuse through their words and actions (indeed, even their unspoken thoughts) to be an advertisement for the beast.

We have a choice: either stand in the gap or take the mark.

Although this has been going on for thousands of years, it is hard to avoid today in the market place of ideas and in the physical things we buy and sell.

We can still repent and change sides. That mark is not a permanent tattoo. Although it is visible to all, it may be difficult to discern just what one is advertising and what one needs to repent of. If anyone is in doubt about what is true, remember what Jesus said and ask the Holy Spirit for help.

John 14:6
Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.

When we make sure we are standing in the gap,
we have rejected the mark.
When we reject the mark,
we become an offense which puts us in the gap.

Blessings to you!

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Also posted on Substack.

Change—Ovi Poetry Challenge

The music took me from my head
down through my heart as Spirit led
me to the Words that I once read
that God is known through love.

Oh, may I make whatever change,
reject all fires that You find strange,
may thoughts unworthy rearrange.
I hunger for Your love.

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Ronovan Hester offers the word “change” as inspiration for this week’s Ovi Poetry Challenge. Also posted in Poet’s Corner.

1 John 4:7-8
⁷Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God.
⁸He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.

Leviticus 10:1
And Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, took either of them his censer, and put fire therein, and put incense thereon, and offered strange fire before the Lord, which he commanded them not.

Psalm 23:1

Linda G. Hill’s One Liner Wednesday.

Stock—Six Sentence Story

Many Israelites, including Gideon’s own father, Joash, built an altar to the Canaanite sun god, Baal, near which they erected a wooden pole to the fertility goddess, Asherah. Gideon’s assignment was to destroy the altar his father built replacing it with an altar to the Lord upon which he would sacrifice the bull from his family’s stock of cattle that was as old as the seven-year Midianite oppression which the Baal couldn’t stop using the Asherah pole as dry firewood.

The next morning the men of the city were horrified to see what Gideon had done. They demanded that Joash bring Gideon to them so they could kill him for desecrating Baal’s hiding place. Abandoning his own idolatry to the point of rebelling against it, Joash told them to let that incompetent Baal avenge itself.

And that’s how Gideon became known as Jerubbaal, the man on whom Baal would have to take revenge all by its lonesome (which it could never have done).

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Denise offers the prompt work “stock” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

To read what really happened to Gideon (Jerubbaal), see Judges 6. In trying to make sense of the significance of what Gideon had done I was particularly influenced by the commentaries BibleHub offered and the Got Questions article on Baal.

A Grove of Trees Silhouetted in the Sunset

A New Year Dawns

Dale offers the prompt “a new year dawns” for this week’s Cosmic Photo Challenge.

Focusing on the word “dawn” and realizing I was often in Florida for New Year’s I picked a few of my favorite winter sunrises over the Atlantic Ocean.